


A Piece of Eight

by ClementineStarling



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Bloodplay, Dom/sub Undertones, Knifeplay, M/M, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-24
Updated: 2016-08-24
Packaged: 2018-08-10 18:39:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7856659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClementineStarling/pseuds/ClementineStarling
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loosely connected snippets from John Silver's perspective.</p><p>Just fyi, the centrepiece of this is part VI, a Billy/Flint episode on a beach with Silver watching, which makes up about half of the words and almost hundred percent of the rating.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Piece of Eight

**Author's Note:**

> For Jaq.  
> And also a bit for Vinehallows maybe? :*
> 
> (Fuck yeah, I finally managed to write fic for this fandom, to the day two years and six months after the first attempt!)
> 
> As usually, everyone's bi, poly and a bit kinky. You know them pirates. Eh, see tags. A bit of dubcon if you squint. Billy's a treasure, Flint longs for punishment, John's a crook. Everything just as expected. Oh, and I gotta warn for soppiness. :)

I.

He still dreams of the gallows. 

At night he hears the crowd jeer in the wind, hears the trample of their feet and the clap of their hands as the waves crash against the hull. He's been to enough hangings to know the sounds and noises, know them so intimately they seep into his dreams like first-hand memories, as though once he'd been standing up there himself, staring down at the audience, noose tight around his neck. But even when he lies awake, listening to the creak of the planks, the moans of the masts and the groans of the ropes, he can't help but think that it's the same wood, the same hemp, just fashioned into another form. Not a scaffold but a ship. And some part of him isn't fooled by the different appearance. How could he not notice the billowing sails are pale as burial shrouds, their noises harsh as the lashes of a whip? Or that the salt is heavy in the air like the stench of blood? Even the bread is as stale as it is in prison. 

He didn't have much of a choice when he signed on. The authorities were right behind him, so close he thought he already felt the hangman breathing down his neck. He'd had a day head start at the most, and he reckoned the merchant ship leaving London for the Americas was his only chance of survival. Under the circumstances he didn't care much that the pay was a joke. When he realised the working conditions were murderous, it was too late. They were high at sea by then, where a captain wields absolute power.

He may have escaped the noose but death is still hard on his heels. As a clever person once put it, _those who'd go to sea for pleasure would go to hell as a pastime._ Every other day an accident occurs, people are injured by the dozens, some die, but no one pays much attention. Life is cheap at sea, and the ocean is every-hungry for fresh bodies. 

The men rot in the stench of the ship's belly, just like the vessel itself rots, shipworms boring into its wood, the food crawling with maggots. It's not only a swimming prison, it's a grave.

One shot is better than none though, and he's not willing to give up. Not just yet.

__

II.

Treason comes easy to him. It runs in his veins, they used to say, as early as back at the orphanage. Said his parents were coiners and clippers, paid the price for it when he was little. That's why they called him Silver. Like the shavings of metal that cost his parents their life. Maybe it was an attempt at erasing the stain of his family name, or perhaps quite the opposite, John could never be sure about their intentions, but he kept the name.

A name is an omen, and little Johnny carried his with pride, determined to live up to its promise. Thus he was taught that words wield power, the most important lesson of his life. 

Words allow you to cloak the truth, disguise its ugliness with flattery and deceit, and people, John found, people rather see the world painted in bright, lurid colours than as the bleak thing it truly is. Sometimes he thinks in another life he would have made a decent priest instead of a silver-tongued forger and fraud. He's not truly evil. He just doesn't think twice when opportunity presents itself. When Fortuna smiles at you, you don't hesitate.

And he tries not to care about the lives these decisions demand.  
Tries not to remember the cook he slew, his last expression of surprise.  
Tries not to flinch when Flint beats a man to a pulp for John's own treachery.  
Ultimately he tries not to think of Flint.

It proves more difficult than he imagined.  
__

III.

If Captain Flint is a monster, John has never before heard of the likes of him. He is not like Avery, not like Teach, certainly not like Benjamin Hornigold. He isn't just a thief or a madman, least of all a soldier gone astray, but he isn't the devil either. Unless perhaps you conceive hell like Milton does. 

Flint isn't the horror that dwells in _mare incognito_ , he isn't the irrational beast that lurks in the dark – he is a monster in the original sense of the word, a sign, a mirror for Christendom to look into and behold its true face. Flint has become what they fear the most: free of their yoke and lash, of their morals and superstitions. He is a man of a new age, an age ruled by reason.

Reason, by itself, offers no comfort, no safe haven, and certainly not salvation. But there is solace in the fact that it's not blind and mindless and greedy like England in her exploitation of the world. Not that Spain or France, the Dutch or the Portuguese were any better. They call themselves Christians, but what they do in the name of the faith is more barbaric than any heathen could have imagined.

When Flint is cruel, he's cruel like a surgeon's cut. Efficient, measured, driven by necessity. It may hurt and bleed and occasionally fester, but it's meant to heal and to save the body, the greater good. Just like in surgery, there are hard decisions to be made and Flint is a man cold enough not to shy away from them.

It doesn't mean there isn't wrath burning inside him, bright and hot, but that's an entirely different thing. It's a flame that reflects the anger, John feels himself, a beacon that draws John to him like a ship towards a lighthouse, even though he can never be sure it's not just a lantern luring him onto rocks. He simply has to believe, Flint is the right man to follow. But it's not only John, there are others who side with Flint, not just because but also despite of what he is, hoping for a new dawn of humankind.

__

IV.

John has convinced himself a long time ago that his taste for the elaborate and foreign is a side effect of his keen mind, a way to appease his voracious intellect. Why else would he find so little joy in the pastimes his crew mates indulge in? Whoring, drinking, fighting and gambling – as entertaining as these activities may be from time to time, none of them manages to capture his attention for long. Sooner or later the excitement wanes and his impatience grows, and he longs for the new, the exotic, the unprecedented. Why satisfy himself with the same-old when he can experience all the wonders of the New World? Clearly there must be better adventures to be had than killing and plundering; being a pirate is not what John ultimately desires to be. It's merely the means to an end. 

It's something he has in common with the captain.

Though what exactly it is Flint hopes to achieve for himself remains a mystery. Even after all these months together, John still has hardly more than an inkling what motivates his captain's actions. He knows the great scheme of course, liberation, freedom, autonomy. But what's at the heart of it stubbornly evades him. He's picked up some shreds and pieces of course but they defy all attempts to be assembled into a meaningful picture. And yet it is what intrigues him most, the riddle that's the man behind the mask.

If he were entirely honest, he'd have to admit that of late he tends to think of this unveiling not only as the solving of a puzzle but also in terms of a more mundane nature. His thoughts return to details of questionable relevance, like for example the patches of pale skin that might be hiding somewhere under his captain's clothes, delicate, forbidden parts of him the sun is never allowed to kiss. He wants to study Flint, body and mind, and uncover every last one of his secrets. He wants to know him more intimately than he knows himself.

__

V.

Imitation surely is the best form of flattery, and John is a master at both, second perhaps only to Flint himself. The both pretend to be whoever people want them to be – pirate, business-partner, diplomat – reflecting desire like mirrors. And who isn't enchanted by one's own dreams? No wonder they make a formidable team. 

There is only one man who eludes the magic they work, only one immune to their story-weaving. John doubts it had to with his literacy – there are other men well read who more or less instantly succumb to Flint's charisma or the sugared half-lies John himself serves them. Only Billy keeps a level head and an autonomous mind. God knows how he does it.

Billy seems, and that's a novelty for John, simply good and honest in such a selfless, incorruptible way it makes him impossible to reckon with. When everyone else are merely pawns in their game, Billy certainly isn't, and it's hard not to fall prey to the fascination he invokes. Billy is like the one pure thing in their world of strife and sin and suffering, more precious than gold and treasure.

John has noticed how Flint looks at him, and he isn't even entirely sure it's only Billy he sees, but nevertheless, it's enough to feel the pangs of jealousy. 

__

VI.

After months at sea, constantly subjected to the rhythm of waves and tide, the sway takes hold in your blood, the ocean begins to live inside you like music, and the day comes that walking over solid ground feels more shaky than standing on the deck of a ship.

It's the day John realises he's become a sailor at last.

It's also the day, Flint has the crew build a tent for him on the shore, at considerable distance to their own camping ground, well out of earshot of the obligatory fuck-tent they set up for the time the careening of the Walrus will take. This time there is no hurry. They picked a beach, so remote and reasonably safe, even DeGroot found nothing to complain about. There is enough work and food and drink and whores to keep everyone occupied and happy.

This however is exactly what rouses John's suspicion. Usually Flint's plans are never to everyone's satisfaction. It's as though he swore a secret vow to make all the world his enemy, and if it's only squabbling about trifles, he just can't pass up an opportunity for quarrel it seems, it would be against his very nature. 

But perhaps this time he's simply planning to enjoy a bit of quiet and read a book. You can never know with Flint.

So John sits in the shade of a palm tree where the burning heat of the day is almost tolerable and waits. When the sun begins to sink and the last of the men abandon their work to partake in the merriment, he sees Flint leave his tent, stalk along the beach like some ill-tempered predator, then take Billy aside for a quick word. Despite the distance he can see Billy's quizzical expression while he listens intently to what Flint has to say, as usual crouching a little to conceal his towering height. Billy's like a big dog in a way, he doesn't need to bark to compel respect. He's just tall and imposing and everyone thinks twice whether to seek a fight with him. Perhaps this goes for Flint too, regardless his fondness for quarrel. Flint's an excellent fighter and tough as old leather but Billy looks as though he could squash him like a bug if he wanted.

Flint strides back to his tent shortly afterwards, tense as always, leaving his boatswain behind with his typical frown. He may look confused, but John knows, Billy is a lot smarter than he appears. It's merely the face he pulls when processing something and it says little about the quality of his musings. Unsurprisingly it doesn't take long until Billy's face regains a semblance of good-natured neutrality and he goes on to mingle with the crowd. But there's no doubt something's afoot.

Another hour passes during which John enjoys a glorious sun-set, a rather decent dinner and a not insignificant portion of extraordinarily fine rum. The stars are already glittering like far away jewels in the velvety night sky when a large figure makes their way towards Flint's abode.

John scrambles to his feet, driven by a keen sense of curiosity. His prosthetic leg may normally prevent him from sneaking up on someone unnoticed, but the sand is stifling the sound of his foot steps more than any other ground would. As he limps closer he is careful to keep his distance. The tent is dimly lit, though even the sparse lighting will be enough to plunge the world around into almost complete darkness for the eyes of the men inside. John isn't going to push his luck nonetheless. After circling the tent, he discovers a conveniently placed gap in the canvas on the side opposite the crew camp, which allows him an excellent view of the interior. Slowly, anxious not to cause any treacherous noise, he lets himself slump into the sand.

Avery, the story goes, took an oriental princess for his bride and they lived in splendour ever after, perhaps to this day, a pirate king and his queen. John knows the fairy tale for what it is, a fabrication of the gullible and desperate, and yet it has forever changed the commoner's imagination of piracy. Buccaneering is now coloured with pictures of the East Indies' famed riches, and even John himself can't shake off this notion as he peeks into Flint's tent.

There are carpets and cushions, blankets and drapes which lend the interior an undeniably sensual air. Flint sits in the middle of it all, shirt unbuttoned, feet bare, and looks up at Billy who looms over him like a djinn conjured from a bottle.

“Please sit,” he says. “Drink?”

Billy nods, face unreadable, and let himself drop unceremoniously on a cushion, while Flint pours him a glass. It's wine, red as blood and almost as thick, a gentleman's drink. They drink in silence. There is already some unspoken bond between them, John has never noticed till now, a queer sense of familiarity. Have they seen each other like this before?

“You remind me of someone,” Flint says finally. “The best man I ever knew. He was tall, not as tall as you, but taller than most. And blond too. Smart. Educated. But the most remarkable thing about him was his heart. He was as generous and forgiving a man as one can possibly imagine. He believed in reason above all else.”

Billy opens his mouth to protest the implied parallel to his character, but Flint stops him with a wave of his hand. 

“You've sailed with me for quite a while now, Billy, and even if you think I didn't notice, I've seen the sacrifices you made, the anger you swallowed.” Something changes in Flint's expression. It's as though the mask crumbles all by itself, and a mere man emerges from the shell of fearsome Captain Flint. There is a vulnerability in his face that makes John's heart clench with an odd longing. 

Flint's voice is rough when he continues. “I know that I'm not a good man. I've done terrible, terrible things. Things that no one could forgive, not even Thomas. Miranda, Mrs. Barlow, tried to tell me, but I was too far gone to stop. It always seems just like another small step, just one last obstacle to overcome. Once you have widened your perspective, seen the whole picture, it's difficult to pay respect to the details anymore.”

“So you call Mr. Gates a detail now,” Billy spits, unimpressed by the confession he's just heard. 

John sees how Flint is inclined to avert his eyes, cast them down in shame, but he holds Billy's gaze. “I loved Hal Gates like a brother,” he says at last. “But yes, he was an obstacle I had to clear out of the way, and as much as it pained me to kill him, I had to do it.”

“So what's the point of this whole meeting,” Billy says, eyes glittering furiously. “You want me to forgive your sins like your precious Thomas, so you can rest easy at night?”

“I want you to deal out a first taste of your punishment”, Flint says and produces a blade. It's a beautiful dagger he offers to Billy on the flat of his palm. “Whatever you see fit, as long as I still can captain a ship.”

John does not believe his ears and neither does Billy.  
“You are joking,” he says. “Is this some sort of test?”

“I would offer you a whip if you preferred it, but I fear, we're still too close to the crew's encampment and we can't have the men take notice and come running to my rescue.” 

“So you want me to _cut_ you?” Billy says. “As a punishment for your crimes?”

Flint nods.

“You must have gone entirely mad,” Billy says, moving to get to his feet, but Flint's hand shoots out to grasp his wrist, holding him back. 

“Please,” he whispers and John thinks he can hear his own heart shatter into a thousand pieces. Perhaps he has seen more of the world and therefore understood at once what the captain is asking for, perhaps it's just that he shares the same proclivities. Sometimes, when your mind is adrift and the world blurs between fact and fiction, the pain puts everything back into focus. 

Flint should have come to him with his request, John thinks. But it's obvious why he chose Billy instead. John Silver is a crook not a moral authority, he can't give the absolution, Flint so desperately craves. And worse, Flint would have to fear, Silver would use the knowledge of Flint's inclinations to undermine his power. If there is one man in the world he can go to for this, it's honourable, trustworthy, virtuous William Manderly. 

“You don't have to use the blade, if you don't want to. You can hurt me otherwise if you like,” Flint offers, and that's around the point where Billy snaps. He lunges at Flint, heedless of the wine and the table or proper manners. Glasses topple over, wine stains the sand, and Billy leans over his captain like a wild beast cut loose, his strong hands wrapped around Flint's throat, squeezing.

“You know how sick I am of you always getting what you want,” he snarls. “No matter what it is, you just set your mind on it, you demand, and the world bends to your will. Why the fuck should I do your bidding? Why should I give in to your fancy?” He has begun to shake Flint who doesn't resist, just lets himself be handled like a rag doll. How much trust does he have to have in Billy to allow him to behave like this?

Billy loosens his grip a little to let Flint gasp for breath.  
“More,” he pants but Billy won't take orders now, not even when they come as pleas.  
“You're some sick fuck,” he says, which strangely sounds less of an insult than all the other things he said before. Almost like an endearment, John thinks, and is proven right when one of Billy's large hands wanders down from the captain's throat over the smooth-shaven expanse of his chest. It's a caress, appreciation, claim all at once. 

“So did you mean what you said? That you want me to hurt you? Isn't there something you'd rather have me do?” Billy's hand glides further down between them and comes to rest over the captain's crotch, a long-fingered sprawl that has Flint arc into it. But Billy still has his other hand placed on his throat, so a little pressure suffices to remind Flint he's entirely at the mercy of his boatswain.  
“What shall it be then, captain?” Billy asks. 

“Do with me as you will,” Flint growls. “Haven't I given you sufficient permission?”

“Aye, captain, you have.” Billy still seems to consider his options, and John does sympathise. He's always taken Billy for a kind and gentle man, no one who would cause harm where it isn't called for. He's seen Billy fighting and he surely has earned his epithet, he is as fierce a pirate as John's ever known one. And he's certainly passionate too. But prowess in battle and a set of ardent beliefs does not make him a dominant lover. 

Flint's request on the other hand is a veritable surprise. Silver wouldn't have dreamed he'd be able to let go like this, surrender to someone so entirely. When he thought of him, fantasised of him, Flint had been his usual self, proud and demanding, took him just as he pleased. In John's imagination Flint was a king and behaved just like one. But he is no less appealing like this, pliable under Billy's hands. On the contrary. There is the most alluring softness in his face when Billy makes up his mind, sheds his own shirt, then starts peeling Flint out of his clothes. Layer after layer the armour comes off, revealing scars and marks, testimony to a life of strife and hardship, but also the spots, John's dreamed of, soft, almost white, untouched by the harsh southern sun and the merciless winds at sea. 

Billy kisses him there, a tender, loving brush of lips against bare flesh, before he does indeed reach for the blade and let it do the kissing for him. 

The blood wells up, so lurid and so wrong, but Flint's moans and sighs make it right again, and John watches, breathless, as Billy carves the evil out of their captain, cut by cut by cut, an intriguing pattern of sin and forgiveness. 

After a while when Flint's eyes have become glassy Billy starts to whisper in his ear, words of comfort most likely, loving nonsense, because he also lets go of the knife and wraps his blood-slick fingers around Flint's cock and begins to stroke. Slow, determined movements of his hand that soon make Flint buck and shiver under him. 

John's mouth is dry as the sand under his foot, his own cock rigid as a ship's mast, and almost comes untouched, when Flint finally spills over Billy's hand, the silver-white of his seed mingling with blood, wine and a generous amount of Billy's spit.

He half-wishes, half-expects Billy to open his breeches, flip Flint over and take his own pleasure, but instead he tears off a piece of his shirt and looks around for something that's, John can only conclude, a stronger drink than wine. He doesn't have to search long, it's a pirate's tent, of course there's rum. He reaches for the bottle, uncorks it, takes a generous gulp himself, then pours it onto the cloth and starts wiping the blood off Flint's body. 

The captain seems somewhat delirious, maybe from the pain, more likely from the mind-numbing force of his orgasm, or perhaps he's simply been more drunk than anyone noticed to begin with. Whatever the reason he hardly twitches when the rum bites into his wounds, just mumbles something incoherent that makes Billy shake his head in goodnatured amusement. 

Honestly, John thinks, this man is too good for this world. It does look as though he'll just take care of the mess he's made of Flint, then take his leave without pressing for his own satisfaction. 

Not too keen on getting caught spying on them, John gets up as quietly as he can and makes for a group of palm trees that will hide him from watchful eyes. The distance appears about three times longer that it actually is. John has to drag himself forwards. He feels stiff, his tongue sticking to the roof of his mouth, his cock straining against his trousers. His whole body is aching with arousal. It's an unspeakable relief to brace himself against the tree with one hand, unlace the strings of his breeches and free his cock. It springs readily onto his palm, hot and hard and eager. 

Usually John takes his sweet time with himself, indulging his fantasy, imagining scenes of the utmost depravity, making his pulls slow and teasing, but today all he has to do is _remember_ to come after only a few determined strokes.

__

VII.

The encounter he witnessed sticks to his mind, stubborn and persistent, and he yearns for a taste of it in the weeks that follow. Looks at Billy whenever he's close by, marvels at the veins protruding from his arms, the defined muscle, the stubble on his jaw, the alluring line of his mouth. His lips are chapped from salt and sun, and John wonders if he tastes like that too.

He watches Billy watching Flint who tries his best not to let anyone guess at the reason his steps are a bit slow and his movements a bit clumsy. But the lines on his face appear softened, the constant frown mellowed. 

He watches Billy demonstratively cutting an apple with Flint's own dagger, popping pieces of fruit into his mouth with almost provocative slowness and watching Flint's face light up in a rare smile.

John always wants things he's never had, things of strange qualities and rare beauty, and these men would make the centrepiece of his collection, true princes of the New World. While others seek treasures like Spanish doblónes or eastern silk, pearls and gemstones, what he wants is a taste of Flint's fire and Billy's golden disposition. And he shall have it, he decides, whatever the cost. Taking a page out of Flint's book has taught him that singlemindedness is the road to success.

Billy is not that hard to win. One night when everyone's ashore and Billy's had a couple of drinks too many, John accidentally stumbles – he can't help the fact the loss of his leg's made him clumsy, can he? – and Billy, gentleman that he is, catches him of course. Strong arms, accelerated heartbeat, quickened breathing. They're so close of a sudden, open mouths warm with rum and sweet from sugared fruit, it's just a dip, a tilt, an inch, and they're kissing, soft and lush, dry lips and slippery tongues, and John feels the surprise unfurl in Billy, the realisation what it is they're doing. He grows rigid for a moment, but John doesn't let go, just keeps kissing, undeterred, and after the first shock wears off, Billy gives into it with more enthusiasm than John could have hoped for.

Billy is, unsurprising somehow, an accomplished kisser. It's hard to imagine something the golden boy isn't perfect at. John revels in the feel of him and is reluctant to interrupt their kiss even when it becomes obvious that there are simply too many layers of clothing between them to get rid of by a bit of blind, impatient fumbling. But Billy's skin, warm, smooth, with a light dusting of fair hair, makes up for the inconvenience, the feel of it so glorious against his own naked flesh, John forgets to breathe for a second. 

Billy can be as gentle as he can be rough, John learns in the following hour. His teeth are as sharp as his lips soft, his tongue as talented as his fingers greedy. The sensations he invokes are like a hoard of finest treasure, and John pays gladly for them with bruises and scratches and a bit of soreness the day after – for what fortune ever comes without price?

__

VIII.

While Billy was an easy mark, Flint eludes him. Weeks and weeks pass, but there is no way to catch him with his guard down. John suspects he still sees Billy, well _fucks_ him to put it plainly, though Billy doesn't let slip as much as a hint about it. Discretion, it seems, is another one of his many virtues.

So John does the only thing he can to win Flint's approval – he struggles and strives to better himself, to remake himself in Flint's image, so he becomes worthy of him. Flint used to be their god whose tempers cast the world into its form, manifested themselves in storms and dead calms and desperation. His demons have become their nightmares, and John has gotten used to them, accepted them for his own foes, the enemy any free man must battle. 

And then when he'd almost given up hope the day would ever come, Flint finally approaches him as an equal. When he tells him of the lure of power, the unspeakable darkness that dwells at the bottom of their soul, of the pleasure to scare, to maim, to kill, he understands that at last he is granted his wish. That his talents are acknowledged, cherished, perhaps feared. This approval he longed for turns out to be a double-edged sword. John knows now what it feels like to hold sway that is more than words or smoke and mirror, but the power to physically hurt someone or end a life, and Flint comprehends, he's not only become a worthy right hand but a threat at the same time.

A warning or a welcome, he's not sure what it is, but at least the time has come that they can finally be honest with each other. 

“Is this what we are now?,” Flint asks him, “friends?”

It's the night in which at last the tables have begun to turn, and they're both aware.  
It's the night in which John may dare place his hand on Flint's thigh without having to fear losing it.  
It's the night in which he meets James McGraw for the first time.

When they kiss it's tentative. John wants to be that friend, but he wants to be a lover too, and he feels it would break his heart to lose that connection due to some thoughtless blunder. 

James is gentle, but it's not a gentleness like Billy's, deriving from kindness, it's a skill taught and learned, a hallmark of civilisation, and John wonders whether he bears witness to the imprint of Thomas' touch, the last and perhaps most subtle traces he left on his lover's soul. James is a gentleman as he explores John's body, there is a certain sophistication to his kisses, a practice in his strokes that stems from practise, perhaps even training.

The arts of love is usually knowledge privy to whores, not to men of letters, much less navy lieutenants, but for pirates don't apply the same rules as for other folk, that's an unwritten law, and on closer inspection, John does not even find it surprising to find Flint so well versed in the techniques of seduction. Isn't being the captain of a pirate ship much like courting? Touting for votes, beguiling the crew with promises of treasure and fortunes, ensnaring it with prospects of liberty? 

They do ply the same trade, him and the captain, and John's always been a swift learner. He's keen to work the same magic, acquire the same skill, the same wicked twist of his hand or wiggle of his tongue that will drive one's partner mindless with desire. He wants to get to know all of James' secrets, map every scar with the tips of his fingers, find every pale spot, discover every place on his body that when kissed will make him shiver and moan. 

James doesn't ask for the same treatment he requested from Billy, but John wouldn't dream of complaining. Their encounter is still rich with unknown pleasures and small yet exquisite sensations, and when John finally realises what James doles out is but a taste of what he can make him feel, just a fraction of the bliss he could invoke, it's already too late. He's addicted to the experience, caught completely and utterly by James' spell.

When James bears down on him, the weight of his hard, muscled body so delightful on his own, their cocks sliding against each other, eager and slick, he swears to himself he will follow him as far as he can, and perhaps even one step further, because in this one moment he can't fathom a life without this, without the man in his arms.

And as far as John is concerned, that's the most he's ever loved someone who wasn't himself.  
Perhaps there's still hope for him. Perhaps one day he'll actually be a better man.  
Only time will tell.

_

**Author's Note:**

> Arrr, thanks for reading, matey. :)  
> In case you noticed grammar or spelling mistakes be a peach and report them. I'm not a native speaker, so I'm eternally grateful for all the help I can get. Other feedback is welcome too of course.


End file.
